Important differences in orientations among the sub segments

Although we have been treating working and nonworking women as different homogeneous groups, it should be recognized that there are also variations within each group. In other words, segmentation of both markets reveals some important differences in orientations among the sub segments. Moreover it may be that breaking women into employed versus non-employed group obscures potentially meaningful time style and lifestyle differences which may have potentially important strategic and public implications.

Large samples of US adult females have identified two types of working wives and two types of homemakers. These four groups have been described as: (1) the working woman who thinks her work is a career; (2) the working woman who says it’s just a job; (3) the home maker who plans to work; and (4) the stay at home homemaker. In addition research on women’s segments has been extended globally where it has been found that the four groups hold across countries and cultures.

From the research we summarize here a few of the consumer behavior differences between these groups. The plan to work segment appears to be the most active and sophisticated in terms of shopping behavior; they are more actively involved in shopping and devote more skill and attention to it than other groups. The career segment is most concerned with shopping for clothes and is not oriented toward budgeting or shopping for specials. The stay at home group appears to be the most economy minded of the segments. The least sophisticated and involved in shopping behavior is the just a job group.

Additionally, it appears that career women shop at specialty stores more than do either women who view their work as just job or homemakers. Career and working women tend to shop more in the evenings and on weekends than do homemakers. These three groups also seem to use substantially different criteria for selecting retail stores in which to shop.

Other research has found that career women and women who view their work as just a job display greater usage of print media (for example, newspapers and magazines), whereas homemakers rely more heavily on television (but not radio).

Descriptions of market characteristics such as those above enable the marketer to tailor distribution approaches, promotional appeals, and products characteristics to one of the segments, based on knowledge of their behavioral and attitude characteristics.

Changing male Roles:

I’m really knocked out. I have to take care of three children prepare the food for them, do their laundry, bring time to school pick them up. At the same time, of course, I have to make a living and try to hold on to my job.

His quote does not seem too unusual until we push aside our stereotypes and realize that it comes, not from a woman but from a 38 year old divorced man. Such is the nature of changing roles for men in American society. A growing number of men in the 1990s will become single, mother / father combinations. Yet, this is only one facet of the nature of these roles shifts. The results of a large scale segmentation study of American men (married and single) in the context of a changing economic an social climate. The findings reveal patterns among men with regard to their attitudes about themselves others around them.

Additional insight into changing men’s roles comes from recent studies specifically of the married male segment. An important finding is that large numbers of married men are assuming a wide variety of non-traditional family roles as shown. Not only are men increasingly pushing the shopping cars, but they are exhibiting behavior that differs from that of women. For instance, when husbands do the grocery shopping they may well choose a brand different from the one the wife would have picked.
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